Stardew Valley creator Erik ‘Concerned Ape’ Barone has taken to X/Twitter to give fans a progress report on the RPG's highly anticipated 1.6 update, and to shed light on his motivation for continuing to work on the popular 2016 farming sim over seven years after it came out.
“A ton of progress on 1.6 last month, it's (self-imposed) extreme crunch mode, nose to the grindstone (raw nose) mode,” said Barone in a recent post. “Here's one of the many additions in 1.6. Keeping mostly everything secret.”
An accompanying screenshot revealed that a new storage chest, which can hold almost twice the amount of materials/items as a regular chest, will be coming to the game as part of the 1.6 update. Sadly, the new post didn’t give any concrete info on when the new content will drop, but Barone’s wording indicates that he has entered the final stage of the update’s development.
A ton of progress on 1.6 last month, it's (self-imposed) extreme crunch mode, nose to the grindstone (raw nose) mode. Heres' one of the many additions in 1.6. Keeping mostly everything secret pic.twitter.com/cFT3Nks8z0
— ConcernedApe (@ConcernedApe) December 1, 2023
The brief post quickly garnered over 130,000 likes, and was met with an outpouring of support from the community, including one curious fan who asked Barone what made him want to keep working on Stardew Valley after so many years.
“Many things, including that so many people are still playing it, and many new people every day, I want it to be the best it can be, It will never be perfect but I feel an urge to keep improving it,” replied Barone. “Up to this point its been my life's work and I care a lot about it.”
The 1.6 update is set to bring a host of new features to Stardew Valley, including new festivals, items, stories, secrets, a new farm type, along with eight-player PC multiplayer support, over 100 lines of new dialogue, and fresh late game content.
Recent months have also seen Barone tease screenshots of his upcoming title, The Haunted Chocolatier, which is set to “channel the energy of the Moon'' relative to Stardew Valley’s Sun. The developer also indicated in a recent interview with IGN that he would be open to creating a Stardew Valley movie adaptation, should the right parters - namely Studio Ghibli or David Lynch - be interested in such a project.
Anthony is a freelance contributor covering science and video gaming news for IGN. He has over eight years experience of covering breaking developments in multiple scientific fields and absolutely no time for your shenanigans. Follow him on Twitter @BeardConGamer
